August 16, 2012

In late July, it was Obama 49%, Romney 46%. This is the Republican’s largest level of support yet in the Badger State. Prior to this survey, the president has earned 45% to 52% of the vote, while Romney has picked up 41% to 46% of the vote.

Retirees are a sizable bloc of voters in Florida, and Democrats are already criticizing Ryan’s Medicare reform proposal in an effort to win those voters. But 48% of the state’s voters fear the president’s health care law more than Ryan’s proposal when it comes to the future of Medicare. Just 41% fear Ryan’s proposal more.

Among seniors, 54% are more fearful of the president’s plan.

Horrible to think that this election turns on who can scare old people more.

ADDED: Proposal for a satirical essay: The 2 parties realize that the election will turn on who can scare old people more. They run scarier and scarier ads, and old people start dying. They're scared to death! Genius ad-makers have reached into the deep core of the elderly brain and hit the mortal terror button. Ironically, so many old people kick off that they no longer determine the outcome of the election. At the last minute, the candidates realize that they need to speak to the young, but they are so deeply mired in scare-the-oldies campaigning that they can't find a way...

My idea for a movie about old people being killed was young people killing them out of anger over the wealth transfers (SS, MC, pension funds, etc.). I think the science (and math) is much firmer with this.

Obama has been stuck around 45-48% approval rating for the last year and a half. In past elections, Presidents do not exceed their approval ratings of likely voters at the polls. (GW hit his approval rating in 2004). There really is no way that approval rating is going to go up unless there is some "beneficial event."

Theoretically, it is possible that you could get people who don't approve of Obama to still vote for him, if they feel the other guys is not qualified or worse. This is why Obama's campaign has been so negative.

I think the only chance Obama has for this election is to get people to believe that Ryan/Romney will "end medicare as we know it." But they are stumbling already with that message.

The Death Paneled MediCare is not that important to the old folks when compared with their Pensions, their Social Security paid into over a life time and all of their dollar fixed investments being Destroyed in the Great Obama Financial Apocalypse of 2013.

Why else are another Federal Agency per week suddenly ordering millions of rounds of ammunition, riot gear and the Marines starting up three new Civil Riot Suppression Brigades?

It's completely backwards. The older you are, the less you have to fear from either of them. This choice is really about the future. Seniors' lives are not going to change much regardless, but the young will either have a vibrant life like the boomers had or one of malaise and limited opportunities at best. The worst possibilities are very bad indeed, but only for the young - the ones who think they will live forever and still don't vote. Like I said, it's backwards.

The problem for Obama and benefit for Ryan/Romney with the medicare issue is that Ryan/Romney have found a way to discuss Medicare in the context of Obamacare. (the fact that Obama took money from medicare to pay for Obamacare). Since so many people dislike Obamacare, it kind of offsets the mediscare fakery put forward by Obama...

The Dems medicare scare tactics won't work this time because the older generation today where young when they first started hearing those scare tactics. Plus, the current older generation today aren't as low information voters as were previous generations. Ryan is well liked by the seniors because seniors too, as Romney-Ryan, want to leave our country a better place for their children and grandchildren.

Not scared about the government failing to be our nanny, no. But scared that the government will drive health-care providers out of business, criminalize what should be ordinary economic activity in the health-care sector, etc? You're damn right I'm worried about that!

Horrible to think that this election turns on who can scare old people more

As William F Buckley said about the KGB and the CIA, to say that the Democrats and the Republicans engage in similar practices is the equivalent of saying that the man who pushes an old lady into the path of a hurtling bus is not to be distinguished from the man who pushes an old lady out of the path of a hurtling bus: on the grounds that, after all, in both cases someone is pushing old ladies around

I think it is that they're just fed up with being treated like dirt. I think a Politico writer (J. Martin?) put out a story about the VP's people trying to taint the pool reports before they went out. It was one thing to expect them to self-censor, and another to step in and try and censor.

Sloanasaurus said... The problem for Obama and benefit for Ryan/Romney with the medicare issue is that Ryan/Romney have found a way to discuss Medicare in the context of Obamacare. (the fact that Obama took money from medicare to pay for Obamacare).

Add from Ryan,My Mom's a Florida senior on Medicare. Our plan improves and secures Medicare for her and others like her.

Worth +5 in Florida

For the Rest of the Nation, expect to see a lot of Erskine Bowles saying:Sensible, Straightforward, Honest, Serious’

I've enjoyed your commentary in the past and I'm glad your'e doing well, but you'd have to be doing extremely well to handle your own health care costs in your senior years. I suspect you mean that you don't rely on government ot take care of you for costs of living, and any social security you receive will not be critical to your survival. But one trip inside the hospital for a bypass or a valve or perhaps cancer treatment could wipe out the savings of most individuals.

I don't mention this as a defense of the status quo, but as an indicator that neither party actuaaly addresses the real problem of sustaining medicare i.e. it is simply not sustainable. Old folks (like me) can't get health insurance because of the certainty that we will consume huge amounts of healthcare resources. Have the gov't step in to foot the bill has only caused the total bill to skyrocket.

I love Paul Ryan and admire his courage in taking on this issue vs the Demo's plan to further the elderly populations dependency on the government. But even his plan is doomed to fail, because the premise of unlimited free health care for an aging population, provided by an industry of dynamic innovators who understood a generation ago that they have tapped into the national treasury--this situation re-defines "unsustainability."

Althouse: Horrible to think that this election turns on who can scare old people more.

False equivalence. The "both sides do it" fallacy. Sad that you would push it Ann, you are better than this.

Fen, it isn't just false equivalence. It's false moral equivalence. This is the excuses children use when tattle-telling on each other, "well, johnny did it too." or "If he can have one, why can't I?"

Democrats and leftards are masterful at it. The fact that Ann pulls that canard out of her skirt whenever she feels like it only indicates that trying to shed the image of being an aging ex-lefty that has shifted into moderate-hood is hard to do. I mean for God's sake, HER SON IS GAY!!! The horror of it all!! (maudlin weeping can now commence).

In 2008, 65+ was the only age group that McCain won. I'm sure there was no punitive intent when Obama signed a health care reform law that will be harmful to those 65 and older. I'm equally sure that the knowledge that changes in health care law that will result in fewer surviving voters over the age of 65 will also result in a future net decrease in the number of Republican voters never entered Obama/Reid/Pelosi's decision making process.

I'm thinking it is a good idea for Paul Ryan to introduce his Mom at the Convention or at a major rally in Florida.Only candidate with a living parent though Romney's Mom lived to 92 and last time I was surprised McCains mom was kicking around.

All she has to say is her dear young Paulie would never, ever mess with seniors like her getting their medicare and SS but the system good for 55 years and older people now must be changed so younger folks can have a retirement....And two million seniors on the sidelines because they are worried go with Romney-Ryan because a 65+ Mom TRUSTS her son.And maybe a million and a half women on the sidelines worried because they Feeeeeeeeeel Ryan and Romney will push granny off a cliff start feeeeeeling the other way.

Chickenlit - No one blasts a Mom for speaking up for their son, unless it is the HIV-ravaged brain of Andrew Sullivan.

So it is clear sailing for Paul Ryan to say that she thinks her little Paul will not only take care of seniors like her, but also their children and grandchildren whose futures are being robbed by Obama.As a plus, if she has a little primetime pre-intro at the Convention, she could herself be introduced by the 100-year old Roberta McCain..Who apparantly is still active and as good-looking as a 100 year old can be. Who could say she is glad a much younger woman like Ryan's Mom is carrying on the tradition of speaking up for the real defenders of the elderly, like she did recommending her young John..(76 years old).

" Old folks (like me) can't get health insurance because of the certainty that we will consume huge amounts of healthcare resources. Have the gov't step in to foot the bill has only caused the total bill to skyrocket. "

The cash model will surprise a lot of you (us). The busiest hip replacement surgeon in Newport Beach CA quit Medicare several years ago and does total hips for about $1700. That is about what Medicare actually pays him and he can do without a back office now and cut his expenses way back.

His fee doesn't cover the hospital but Medicare is still an option there. It will not be too long before, assuming Obama is re-elected, the Medicare world will be doctor free. How about a nurse-practitioner doing your total hip ?

Back in the early days of heart valve replacement, the rumor was that an old colored lab tech who worked for Al Starr was the best heart surgeon in the world, although his practice was limited to lab animals.

Michael K, you sure you aren't thinking of Vivien Thomas, who was Alfred Blalock's surgical tech? Thomas, although not an MD, did assist with human surgery. He was not restricted entirely to the animal lab.

Not sure how it's relevant anyway, but that's the better-known story of a tech who was likely better at the procedure than his MD counterparts--and at Hopkins with some of the most talented counterparts in the entire world, no less.

Dog bites man. Rasmussen has had Romney up by around 3 points the entire election cycle. In light of that, Wisconsin is exactly what you'd expect from Rasmussen and Romney would actually seem to be underperforming in Florida.

To be clear, I'm not saying Rasmussen is necessarily wrong, though that's the way to bet. The point is there's nothing new here. There's no movement toward Romney.

I think the press may stop shielding Obama soon. They stopped shielding Carter around 1980. I was in the Philippines in 1979, so I was really shocked at how the networks were treating Carter when I returned. We did not see that on Armed Forces TV overseas. When they turn, they really turn. Of course, it was easier for them to vilify him because he was a southerner.